Page 32 of Lord Appleby's Gorgeous Imposter
“You are kind. Is there a theme?”
“The glories of Rome.” His beady eyes blazed with mischief.
She tipped her head—a real ingenue could not appear more naïve. “That calls for a simple gown of cream.”
“Draped supplely over your perfect curves, mademoiselle.”
A hand to her cheek to hide her anxiety, she feigned joy at the compliment and gushed, “Now, monsieur, you must go home, lest my complexion become a permanent blush.”
She waited until she heard the last of Cyprien’s remarks to Franck drift up the stairs. Then she headed down the hall to her small salon. In a brief conversation, she’d told Tate to find the room as others began to leave the house.
She hurried along the hall, bypassing the staircase down, eager to see Tate and hear why he too wished to go to the house in rue du Four.
*
Tate sat ina chair reading, little Louis snuggled into him, draped over his thighs. She liked this room. Cozy with only two chairs and a chaise longue, it had one wall of bookshelves. The tiny room was made for one who liked to read. Viv spent much of her free time here. She was filled with a sense of déjà vu seeing Tatein a cozy chair with her little pet. Tate and she had always shared a love of books, plays, and animals.
As she walked in, Tate got to his feet. Louis scrambled to find a new comfortable position in the chair.
“Don’t you always marvel how animals remember people?” she said, proud of her pet.
“Those who love remember who loved them, no matter the years that have passed.”
His words felt like a reprimand of her recent behavior toward him. Unsettled, she sought to bring him to the issue at hand. She sat on the chaise longue. “Why do you wish to go to rue du Four?”
“It would be helpful to remember—”
“Those who loved us no matter the years that have passed?”
“That,” he said, his rich jade gaze examining her with sweetness, “and what happened that night.”
She sucked in a breath. “I have not forgotten a thing.”
He gazed at her long and hard as if to question that, then took the space beside her. “Are you certain?”
“I do not forget the who, what, and how of that night.”
His thigh warmed hers. His words were a tender balm against the chill of remembrance. “I recall the color of your gown.”
“Blue with tiny white stripes.”
“Diane’s was—”
“Green,” she said with distaste. “Emerald muslin.”
“You and Diane reined in Charmaine.”
She tipped her head. “The speed with which you jumped from the carriage to get Diane.”
His jaw flexed. “You mean the way I failed. The way the gendarmes hurried her away to a waiting tumbril. Diane was so brave, cursing them, angry. They knew her name. Her full name.”
Viv caught her breath. “They called her by name?”
“They did.”
“I didn’t remember that! How could they know it?”
“I have asked myself that for ten years. Our own carriage was hired. We had no escutcheon on the door.”
